Thai opposition loses bid to annul election

Thai anti-government protesters wave national flags during a rally at China town in Bangkok on Feb 1, 2014. Thailand's Constitutional Court on Wednesday rejected a request by the country's main opposition party to annul a controversial election disrupted by anti-government protests. -- FILE PHOTO: AFP

BANGKOK (AFP) - Thailand’s Constitutional Court on Wednesday rejected a request by the country’s main opposition party to annul a controversial election disrupted by anti-government protests.

The court said in a statement that it had declined to consider the petition by a Democrat Party lawyer to nullify the February 2 vote because there were insufficient grounds.

Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra called the election in an attempt to assuage opposition protesters who have staged more than three months of mass street protests seeking her resignation.

The Democrats boycotted the vote, saying it would not end a political crisis stretching back to a military coup in 2006 that ousted Yingluck’s elder brother Thaksin Shinawatra as premier.